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Living Laboratory

A living laboratory is a place to discover and investigate the working world around us. Our campus operates as a small city, supporting over 30,000 visitors a day in hundreds of buildings across 400+ acres.

Imagine the possibilities...

Engagement Opportunities

Meet Our Partners

Hands-On Learning Experiences

Waste Audit & Increasing Diversion Rates

Facilities Management & Campus Sustainability seek to conduct on-campus waste audits. We are seeking the engagement of faculty and students in this process. Below are some suggested areas of involvement.

Tree Plantings Support Tree Campus USA Certification

Every year Facilities Management’s Landscaping Services Department plants at least 50 additional trees on campus. These trees support an expansion of our urban forest, as well as the caliper replacement of trees that had to be removed due to construction or end-of-life failure. We are seeking student classes and organizations (minimum of four students at a time), who are interested in helping with tree plantings. – Contact Jessica Rose in Facilities Management: JRose@GaTech.edu

The Eco-commons – A Performance Landscape

The Eco-Commons is conceived to be 80 acres of engineered waterway designed to replicate the stormwater management of an original stream running through campus. The goal is to achieve 50 percent reduction in stormwater runoff. We are seeking academic partners to investigate best practices in performance landscape, design and measurements of success.

Expert in the Classroom

Facilities Management includes a wide variety of experts who may be able to offer insight to real-world applications of environmental sustainability principles that undergraduate students are learning in the classroom. If you are interested in scheduling a Facilities professional to visit your classroom, let’s talk. Professions and sample topic-areas are listed below.

a. Green Cleaning Program Manager: Cleaning with ionized water, micro-fiber cloths, etc. How does indoor air quality impact building occupants?

b. Recycling Program Manager & Recycling Collections Associate: What contamination items are very problematic in our waste streams and why? How is recycling waste collected on campus? Understanding the business side of recycling.

h. Environmental Programs Manager: Why and how do we monitor our GHG-emitting equipment? Which everyday items and processes emit the most GHG? How do EPA regulatory requirements impact our operations? What is an indoor air quality investigation and why do we do it? What does “non-attainment area” mean and what operational implications does that have on our campus?